TRIMET OCTOBER BOARD MEETING

 Well folks its that time again, another fabulous board meeting is about to happen.

 As we who follow the agency know that the transit division that supplies transit to citizens is barely functional these days and very  unreliable. This isn't unique to TriMet is basically all of the larger transit agencies. 

The career technocracy whines about the "operator shortage" but do nothing but offer a bonus to new hires. All current employees are excluded from this offer however, which is an insult to all the employees currently suffering through the job.

 Lets remember that TriMet specifically spent the last decade destroying the pensions and health benefits  that made it one of the best districts in the nation and a work place worthy of your labor. Now nobody wants the job. The technocracy ruined the job but has a convenient excuse, the "labor shortage" which we all know is a pay shortage. It has been my opinion that TriMet never intended to bring back service. They were lying about that and now we find out that they intend to "transform" the current system into something else. Its unfortunate indeed that the riding public is stuck with a transit agency that "does what it wants when it wants" regardless of what the public thinks or wants.

That being said, although the actual service part of TriMet is in a decrepit state  and unreliable, the other part of TRIMET, the capital projects monster, chugs on at 100%. This is by design. We all know that its the capital projects that transfer the tax funds into the hands of the elites. For example the so called BETTER RED is a project that was not needed and has no real purpose other than feeding the capital projects monster. So lets see what's planned at this next meeting

1-First up is a change to the EXCLUSION RULES   so more and more people can be excluded from the system. I have a lot of problems with this but the majority of citizens seem to favor harsher and harsher penalties be imposed on themselves and the police state that we live under continues to grow. That police state will eventually affect all of us. TriMet pretends they are a tolerant agency when the exact opposite is the truth.

2-TriMet has $129,000,000+ to hand out for various pork barrels. Same as it ever was-READ IT HERE

3-$1,763,000 to "retrofit" THE RUBY JUNCTION MAINLINE SUBSTATION. Is it actually needed? Who the fuck knows.

4-$2,077,000 to   YELLOW LINE LIGHT RAIL SUBSTATION FEEDER BREAKER RETROFIT . Is it actually needed? Who the fuck knows. One thing we know for sure is that light rail uses up BILLIONS AND BILLIONS of tax payer cash to keep it going and that the concept that its "cheaper to run than a bus" is just more false propaganda thrown at the ignorant masses

5-$3,204,000 for the BUS SAFETY SHIELDS. All the money they wasted on the ineffective shields lets make sure we don't talk about that. It's only tax money. I was under the impression, and I heard it at a board meeting, that these new shields were to be installed by the end of this year. Apparently they lied about that along with all the other lies that come out of the executives mouth. Maybe they can get them all installed by the end of they year, what do I know.

6-$3,627,000 for ) FOR AUDIO/VISUAL (AV) EQUIPMENT DESIGN, MAINTENANCE  who the fuck knows what this is and what this is supposed to improve over there. 

7-$7,612,000 to PROCESS LIFT APPLICATIONS TO TRANSDEV. These thing should all be done "in house" but TriMet is a money laundering machine and TRANSDEV is an international conglomerate:   ransdev is a public limited company with a Board of Directors, jointly owned by the Caisse des Dépôts Group (66%) and the RETHMANN Group (34%).

8-$1,121,000 for the  FOR THE PURCHASE OF A WORKHORSE RAIL CAR MOVER  . Why not right? Get as much junk as you can just make sure you don't raise operator wages.

9-$3,500,000 for   THE PURCHASE OF FIVE GENERATORS. I think they should get ten of them. Why not? Get 20 for that matter.

10-My favorite one, E PARK AVENUE PARK & RIDE EXPANSION  This is a no bid contract to expand the park and ride. Ridership may be down 50% but we need more parking right? What a farce this all is